In which I form strong opinions about things I don't know enough about.

Sunday, 12 October 2014

The only thing worse than being talked about...

If, as Oscar Wilde famously put it, the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about then Graham Harman could certainly have things worse. To be sure, people are talking.

However, of course, one never wishes to be merely criticised. To be criticised well—that is the tacit compliment one must hope for. And having read the first instalment of Peter Wolfendale's surgical broadside against Harman's work—namely The Noumenon's New Clothes (Part 1)—I can only conclude that Harman is being criticised really rather ably, albeit with an attitude that is not exactly cordial.

Now, I haven't followed the ins and outs of this kerfuffle over time and to be honest I don't really care that much. However, to have one's work subjected to such forensic criticism can only be a compliment of sorts, even if said forensics are openly pursuing a policy of annihilation by scorched earth. To be the subject of such an analytical blitzkrieg is assuredly not the worst thing in the world.

So, 'SR,' 'OOP.' Moribund? Perhaps. Dead? Not with this level of chatter on the lines. Even as something to react against, Harman's work is clearly vitalising for many.

However, having said that, I am less and less interested by it every time I read some of it. Despite Harman's prolific output I haven't detected a great deal of evolution or progression (or even consolidation) in his ideas over the past several years—and I was fairly unconvinced of the major points of his philosophy to begin with.

The 'reduction to relations' critique is often asserted but rarely argued and I've never found it in the least bit convincing. Without that bombshell in place the substance-oriented edifice doesn't have a leg to stand on (to mix my metaphors) and becomes just a rather de-nuanced, metaphysical version of actor-network theory with the word 'realism' inserted at strategic intervals.

Harman points, fairly enough, to the fact that a great many people are interested in his work. However, to say that a philosophy is demonstrably popular is not an overwhelmingly strong defence of its validity. Its value should be assessed by the quality control department, not sales. It is entirely possible that its popularity and its controversy issue from the same sources: excessive simplicity, depthless polemic and unprogressive repetitiveness.

Anyway, the only way to kill something off, ultimately, is to stop talking about it. And I'm not sure that we're there yet, but we may be getting closer.